We joined about a dozen other boat owners who volunteered boats and time to teach almost 40 inspired women new skills and take several for their very first sail. It was a perfect intro weekend with gentle breezes and warm temperatures. Now what?

Have you wondered about Treasure Island and Olympic sailing's move west, and the silence after the bold announcements of 2018? Yes, it's been quiet, but only because the folks behind FAST, the Facility for Advanced Sailing and Technology, have to move at the pace of larger forces.

Ten yacht clubs raced 10 matched J/22s in a three-day challenge to win some heavy silver Friday through Saturday. Friday's windy race on heavy ebb-chop took the four-person teams, with women at the helm, from St. Francis Yacht Club, which provided the boats, to event co-host Richmond Yacht Club.

Former Stanford head sailing coach John Vandemoer will not serve a prison sentence for his part in the college admissions scandal. Vandemoer was the first person to be sentenced as a result of the federal sting called Operation Varsity Blues.

I could hear a ticking sound from the direction of the stern as I was gently rolling side to side. With the sails up and the motor off, the new and unusual sound warranted investigation. I finally tracked it to the…

It was the best kind of win for what’s fast becoming the best kind of race. Due to glitches on boats and ashore, nobody knew who was ahead or who would win the 700+ mile Race to Alaska until they hove into view off the Ketchikan Yacht Club yesterday.

We were shocked to receive the news that the German pilot schooner Elbe No. 5 — which several generations of Bay Area sailors will know best as 'our' lovely Wander Bird — sank on Saturday after a collision with a commercial ship on the Elbe River near Hamburg.

We once saw a man walk on water. We were sailing back home to Lowrie in San Rafael after a long, splendid day on the Bay. As we close-reached up the channel, we saw a man . . . surfing without a wave, sail or kite. If we hadn't been keeping up on watersports trends, we may very well have thought that someone was walking on water.

We were out of Cabo San Lucas headed for Puerto Vallarta when a frigatebird came swooping in, circling, circling, gliding in a steep left bank until its wingtip nearly touched the ocean, the top of its wings black, glistening in the late afternoon sun.

Peter Bailey’s lovely yawl Bertie was capsized by what he believes was a white squall 65 miles off Atlantic City, New Jersey, at about 8 p.m. on May 29. Bailey and his wife, Heidi Snyder — the only ones aboard at the time — managed to activate their EPIRB and were rescued about three hours after the capsize.

Saturday, June 8, is World Oceans Day. The United Nations website tells us that oceans play a major role in everyday life. And put it simply: “They are the lungs of our planet, providing most of the oxygen we breathe.”

Lowell Orton North, the founder of North Sails, Olympic gold medalist, and sailing icon of his time, passed away on Sunday. There will not likely be another sailor like Lowell North. He was 89 years old.

On the windward shore of the Big Island [meaning California], a stone's throw from the cool Monterey Bay trades, unfolds the all-new Antrim 27 ‘C’. Number 28 (27 were built by USI) is now under construction by builder Joe Kitchell.

Barry Spanier has his sights set on one of the most pressing environmental issues of our time: plastics in the ocean. Spanier conceived of a boat called the "Baleen" (also known as Ships that Scour the Sea), named after filter-feeder whales.

On June 1, the American team of Mike Holt and Carl Smit won the 51-boat 5O5 Euro Cup Riva del Garda, the second leg of the Euro Cup series. Sailed at Fraglia della Vela Riva on Italy's Lake Garda, the regatta came down to the last leg of the last race.

Excellent conditions made for a quick Delta Ditch Run on Saturday, June 1. A flood current and consistent breeze in the teens carried most of the sailors to Stockton with plenty of time left to party. The 29th edition of the 65-mile race from Richmond to Stockton garnered 109 starters.

After nearly 250 days at sea and 31,000 continuous, nonstop miles — including a lap around the Southern Ocean and one and a half times around the world — Randall Reeves has made his first stop of the Figure 8 Voyage 2.0

No one would have expected one of the Southern Hemisphere’s best-known and most-traveled yachts to be lost at sea en route to the start, but that’s exactly what happened to Brian Petersen’s Auckland, New Zealand-based Elliott 50 Ran Tan II.

They're off. And they're almost there (or already finished, by the time you read this). Three 70-ft trimarans made a brief appearance on San Francisco Bay as they tuned up and got ready to blast down the coast in the inaugural California 500 race from San Francisco to San Diego.

The MOD70s 'Powerplay' and 'Argo' and the Multi 70 'Maserati', have been tuning up on the Bay getting ready for tomorrow's 12:55 start in California Offshore Race Week's CA 500 — a new 500-mile 'sprint' from San Francisco to San Diego.

Call of the Sea will hold their annual fundraising gala on Saturday, June 8. The event benefits Call of the Sea's on-the-water education programs and the completion of the new educational tall ship Matthew Turner.